riggerrob

I doubt if tandem students notice wing-suit fly-bye. For example, several years ago, the most experienced wing-suiter on our DZ asked permission to fly by my tandem. We briefed a flight pattern, more than 3 canopy spans off to the side, etc. Shortly after opening, I spotted him over my left shoulder and pointed him out to my student. My student did not notice the wing suit until he was almost level with us. The student only tracked him for a few seconds, then lost sight of the wing suit (in the ground clutter) after he descended below the horizon. The student did not mention the wing suit after we landed. Conclusion: the wing-suit fly-by did not stick in the student's memory.

Lol is that standard dz etiquette? It probably wouldn't be considered a foul... ....................................... Just do it in the middle of the student landing field! Hah! Hah!

If you think USPA gets uppity about endangering their (tandem) cash cow ..... try injuring a cow in India! Boo! Hiss! Crowds pursuing you with pitch forks !!!!!

............................................... I am guessing that 47 is the average age of licensed jumpers. The bulk of fatalities are licensed jumpers screwing canopies into the ground. Despite vast increases (since 1980) in the numbers of students, student fatalities have remained steady (low) because of more reliable parachutes and better instruction. We also see seasonal peaks in fatalities. There are usually a few deaths during Christmas and New Years boogies (at big DZs). The second seasonal surge is around Easter (end of March) as smaller DZs reopen and rusty jumpers blow off the rust. The third spike occurs during August when jumpers get hot, tired and over-confident.

FARS say " in accordance with the manufacturers' instructions ...." It does not matter whether those "instructions" are written in a manual, service bulletin, technical bulletin, etc As long as you have a piece of paper from the manufacturer you are "legal." When in doubt, work to the tightest standard or the most recent document. In related news, I have a letter from Altico saying that it is okay to pack a Dolphin with 1 flap (ala. Dolphin manual) over the reserve pilot chute or 2 flaps (ala. Javelin manual), so I pack Dolphin reserves with 2 flaps covering the reserve pilot chute. I prefer 2 flaps because it reduces the risk of snagging the pilot chute. .... And I must admit to being too lazy to learn a Dolphin-specific packing method, so I just apply Javelin packing methods to Dolphins.

....... It all reminds me of the story of how supposedly they didn't want to issue parachutes to military aviators in WWI because it would just encourage them to chicken out and bail out. Can't have a safety device because some might misuse it! (It was more complex than that of course.) ................................ An ex post facto justification spouted by a pompous British General! Hah! Truth be told, no Air Force developed reliable PEPs for airplane pilots until several years after the war. Only balloonists routinely wore PEPs during WW1, and they survived maybe half the time. Statistics are not readily available because aircrew casualties were less than one percent of ground casualties. Several battles saw 100,000 ground casualties per day!

The new USPA BSR is being debated on the wingsuit thread and the safety thread and the training thread. USPA is saying that wing-suits need to maintain a minimum of 500 feet horizontally from tandems hanging under canopy. Why is the new BSR not being debated on the tandem thread? What do TIs think of banning wingsuits from flying-by tandems under canopy? Should USPA be allowed to ban the sacred "right" of wing-suiters using tandems as slalom pylons as they fly back to the DZ?

That reminds me of an incident at Perris Valley, California around the turn of the century. (FAA Senior Rigger) "Dead Ted" was accused of packing a damaged Phantom reserve into a Mirage container with cracked stiffeners. Ted's signature was the last on the card. However, Ted denied recently repacking that reserve and it was not (recently) recorded in his rigger's logbook. A review of documents revealed that Ted was the last rigger who had packed that reserve, but it was years earlier. An investigation (by the local FAA DPRE) revealed that the owner deployed his Phantom, repacked the (damaged) reserve himself and forged Ted's signature on the card. Ted was absolved of any wrong-doing. The owner was fined $500 by the FAA because he forged a signature. The FAA fined the owner because this was the third time they caught the owner forging signatures.

Last time a wingsuiter suggested flying by my tandem, I told him to stay more than 3 wingspans off to the side in case the student pulled a hasty turn. That was 3 years ago. Now I will follow the new USPA guideline. If any wingsuiter flies too close to a tandem, I will ask manifest to keep him off any load I am on. Since these days tandems pay to keep DZs open and most loads contain tandems .... the offending wingsuiter will spend the rest of the day on the ground. These days I divide my jumps between tandems and wingsuits, but the bulk of my jumps are tandems. The new USPA guideline is "best business practice" even though I no longer live in the USA and have not paid USPA membership in 15 years.

According to police, a search warrant was issued on the reality TV star (real name: Austin Russell) for an alleged sexual assault. When the warrant was executed, officers found marijuana and methamphetamine, as well as a weapon." ......................... Marijuana I can believe, but he does not look like a meth' user!

I can see that, but it makes no sense. It just complicates things. My guess still remains they wanted to be slightly quicker to roll and initiate a turn in horizontal flight. ................................ Anhedral does reduce roll stability, making it quicker rolling (and pulling) to a new heading.

Taped patches don't last very long in the California desert. First, desert grit sticks to the edge of the patch and grinds on canopy fabric. Secondly, hot dry weather dries out adhesive pretty quickly and patches fall off, leaving a large, ugly, stained weakened piece of (original) canopy fabric. These days I only patch drogues with sticky tape and sew a row of E-thread around the edges.

Negative dihedral (aka anhedral) shifts the center of lift forward when it transitions from horizontal flight (wing lift) to hovering (fan lift).

Sure it is possible for a forger to buy a seal press, red thread and a bag of lead seals. Then press a fake new lead seal on a reserve ...., BUT .... most forgers are lazy and cheap. And besides, every time my name appears on a packing data card, I pocket $80. I don't care if my signature is genuine or forged, because every time my signature appears on a reserve card, I get paid.

Bummer man! The up side is that I every day I see stroke survivors walking around town. I also see former babies walking around town. I have been skydiving for almost 40 years now, but had to spend 2014 on the ground because of knee surgery. I visited the DZ and kept my hands busy rigging. As soon as the surgeon cleared my knee to resume jumping, I did a handful of solo jumps then promptly started training a pair of new TIs. Would love to chat more, but today is the first sunny Saturday morning of the year. Gotta go to the DZ ..... to do some rigging .... yeah ..... rigging .....

.. ....... I'm stuck trying to find the "fancy" word though. ......................... Hypoxia a medical term meaning low (hypo) on oxygen (oxia.) There are a variety of ways to get low on oxygen: smoke inhalation, lung disease, flying above sea level or ingesting drugs like alcohol. Alcohol reduces the amount of oxygen that you blood can carry out to your organs. Combine this with smaller amounts of atmospheric oxygen above 5,000 feet above sea level and you get a double dose of low oxygen levels: degrading vision, reaction time, logic, decision-making, etc. the worst thing is that both alcohol and hypoxia induce euphoria in most people, so they stubbornly rely any impairment even when their buddies see them staggering, slurring their words, etc.

Agreeing with everything Gowlerk and totter said and elaborating on what Elisha said. Many jump-planes carry more jumpers than the plane was originally certified for because they have been gutted and only carry partial fuel. Gutted means removing components no longer needed for day VFR flight, including: de-icing boots, cabin pressurization, fancy upholstery, toilets, inflight kitchen, etc. Many jump planes further reduce weight by rarely carrying more than 2 hours worth of fuel. For example, early Beechcraft King Airs have a total of 6 fuel tanks with one tank in each engine nacelle, plus 2 more tanks in each outer wing panel. Since they only need nacelle tanks for flying jumpers, many DZOs forget to fill the outer wing tanks all summer, then wonder why they dry out, crack and leak. Oh! Well! We weren't using the outer tanks anyways. Cessna 172 - 3 jumpers Cessna 180 and 182 - 4 or 5 jumpers Cessna 205 and 206 - 6 jumpers Beech 18 - 12 to 14 jumpers DeHavilland Twin Otter - 19 to 24 jumper Shorts Skyvan - about 20 jumpers

The right riser cover has a wrinkle in its lower corner. That wrinkle costs him valuable fashion points!!!!!!

Welcome back! Shaky hands are a perfectly healthy response to an adrenaline rush. We would wonder if you were not shaking. How cold has it been in Kamloops this winter? A second possible explanation is that you forgot your wooly long underwear.

Donald Trump's father was arrested at a KKK rally (according to Wikipedia.) Wikipedia also says that Trump senior was accused of being a racially-biased landlord who refused to rent apartments to blacks. I believe that the KKK should be allowed to speak freely at public rallies .... as long as they are surrounded by Swedish clowns wearing brightly-coloured wigs, rubber noses, floppy shoes, etc.

How many towns can you drive through and remain 1000 feet from a school? Not in most American towns! Sounds like a subtle way to ban any firearm within town limits.

I suspect that some military ATRs have already been jumped by Search and Rescue specialists. That aft cargo door certainly looks big enough to launch chunks. What is the largest shipping/baggage container you can stuff into an ATR? Is it certified to fly with the door removed? The biggest limitation on ATRs - as civilian jump planes - is their size. With 42 or more seats, civilian DZs would have difficulty attracting enough skydivers to keep an ATR busy. Turbine-powered jump planes are only profitable when you keep them busy enough to hot-load and hot refuel (e.g. 25 loads per day). Number of seats is the same reason few civilian DZs operate jump planes much bigger than 20-seater Twin Otters or Skyvans. Back during skydiving's boom years (1990s) a few of the busiest DZs flew 30-seater CASA 212s but the industry seems to have settled on 12 to 20 seat airplanes because they match demand.

....... (edit: I think "no Gun zones" in general are really stupid. Though I'd have to support a property owner's decision to have it in place and would respect it on their property. I'd still think he's making a stupid choice.) ................................................. What if a farmer posts (numerous) signs - on his fences - saying "No hunting on XYZ Ranch?"

Every reserve manufacturer makes a reserve certified for jumpers who weigh more than 200 pounds. Hint: they have more than 200 square feet.

***Something to think about is not a design problem with a reserve, it's a design goal. You wouldn't put a F14 shaped wing on a cessna! For a reserve it's the same idea, design goals. Why did the micro-ravens stall when heavily overloaded? They were not designed to be used that way! .... or get a bigger reserve. ......................................................... Back when Ravens were introduced (mid-1980s) no-one was loading main canopies at 1 pound per square foot ... so why anyone would expect a heavily-loaded (more than 1/1) Raven to land softly is a complete mystery to me?????? I cannot follow the logic/math of people who want to heavily-load Micro Ravens. Have they considered the lost wages while they recover from a broken ankle?